The first thought that came into my head when I put Riding the Bus with My Sister down was, “I couldn’t be this honest in a million years.”

Because the thread running through Rachel Simon’s autobiographical account of her relationship with her sister Beth, who has a developmental disability, is honesty.

For Christmas, Rachel gifts her sister with an unconventional present; she agrees to ride the city buses with Beth, joining in the activity that’s become central to Beth’s life and meeting the drivers and riders in whose company Beth spends all her time. But becoming immersed in Beth’s life changes her perspective on the management of her sister’s disability, introducing her to the concept of self-determination, its pitfalls and its advantages. She gets to know the people behind the scenes of Beth’s life, the case workers, the bus drivers who love her and those who think her a menace or a burden. And in unraveling the bright, exuberant tapestry that makes up Beth’s days, she finds the answers to some of her own questions and begins to discover things she needs to learn from Beth instead of the other way around.

Riding the Bus with My Sister is an uplifting read, and a touching one. But if my summary makes it sound all kittens and unicorns, let me disabuse you of that notion right now. There is frustration and anger, confusion and regret. Simon does not dwell only on memories that make her look good but picks out the times when her patience failed or her embarrassment boiled over.

Similarly, Beth isn’t painted as a saint who happens to have a disability – she is shown at times to be infuriating, contrary, garrulous and spiteful. Forgiving, friendly, hilarious and sweet. In other words – a whole, entire person like any other, who happens to need some extra help here and there and processes things differently.

In painting the way she and Beth found each other and developed their relationship as adults, Simon shows others with disabled family members that being fallible is not a sin. She absolves those who have experienced frustrations and shows a path to harmony that can only help people in similar situations to enrich their lives. But people like me, who have no mentally disabled family members, can stand to learn a thing or two about life, acceptance, and seizing the day from Beth’s flyaway approach to every day, and from the wisdom of the drivers she’s encountered.

The accomplished writing underscores each sentiment in a quiet, unobtrusive way that serves only to mark its greatness, and all in all this book can only be further evidence of Simon’s way with words. Amazing.

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